by Don Winslow
“You want me to send some of my people?”
“Focus on Baja.”
“The fuck you think I’ve been doing?” she asked.
Yeah, green sky, Ric thought.
“This is delicious,” Karin says now, holding up a spoon of pudding. “Have you tried it?”
“It’s great.”
“How old is Oviedo anyway?” Karin asks.
“Twenty-five going on thirteen,” Ric says.
Technically, Oviedo is the plaza boss for Baja, but Ric finds it easier to work around him and meet with Iván, who’s having a hard time letting go of control anyway. Oviedo is a nice kid, but he’s still a kid, not serious, and Ric finds it tough to get anything done with him.
Iván walks over to the table. “I have to make a call. You got this?”
Ric nods.
“Where’s he really going?” Karin asks.
“There’s sort of a party after the party,” Ric says. “He’s probably taking care of a few details.”
Coke, hookers . . . coke.
“Are you going to that?” Karin asks.
“No, I’m going back to the hotel with you.”
“Are you sorry you’re not going?”
“No,” Ric says. “No, I’m not.”
About five minutes later the restaurant door opens and Ric looks over, expecting to see Iván, but instead sees a guy dressed in black with a hood over his head and an AK-47 pointing in front of him.
Putting his hands on Karin’s shoulders, Ric pushes her under the table. “Stay there.”
More men come through the door.
Ric sees Oviedo reach for a gun at his waist that isn’t there. None of them are carrying, this being a fancy dinner in Jalisco where Tito Ascensión has personally guaranteed the Esparza brothers’ security. So they’re totally fucking helpless as the gunmen—there are about fifteen of them—start to sort the women from the men.
Karin screams as a man reaches under the table and grabs her wrist.
“It’s okay, babe,” Ric says to her. To the gunman, he says, “You hurt her, I’ll kill you.”
The gunman who came in first starts shouting orders. “Women on this wall! Men on that wall! Move!”
Ric knows the voice.
Damien.
Ric steps over to the wall and lines up alongside Oviedo, Alfredo and six other men. He looks across the dining room at Karin, who’s crying and looks terrified.
He smiles at her.
The floor is littered with handbags, purses and high-heeled shoes.
“Go!” Damien yells.
His people start down the line of men and one by one turn them against the wall, secure their wrists behind their backs with plastic ties, and walk them out the door.
Ric’s the last one.
“Not him!” Damien yells. “Leave him!”
He walks up to Ric. “Where’s Iván?”
“I don’t know, man.” Ric shrugs.
Damien leans back and points the AK barrel at Ric’s face. “Where the fuck is he?!”
Ric feels dizzy, like he’s going to pass out. Feels like he could shit his pants but he forces his voice to stay level as he says, “I told you, I don’t know.”
He can see Damien’s eyes through the slits in the hood.
They’re blazing with adrenaline.
“We’ll wait for him,” Damien says.
“You don’t have time for that, D,” Ric says with a calm he didn’t know he had. “We have people just down the street. They’ll be here any second. If I were you, I’d go before you have to shoot your way out.”
“I heard you’ve been sticking up for me,” Damien says.
“Now I’m sorry I did.”
“Don’t be,” Damien says. “It’s the only reason I’m not taking you with the rest of them.”
Then Damien backs off and yells, “Okay! Let’s go! We got what we came for!”
Well, two out of three brothers, anyway, Ric thinks.
The gunmen go out, and Damien is the last through the door.
Ric goes and grabs Karin. Wraps his arms around her and says, “It’s okay, it’s okay. It’s all good now.”
Except he knows it’s not.
Keller sits with Marisol on the little deck outside the second floor, trying to get some relief from the sweltering August night. Summers in DC are what he calls “three-shirt weather”—if you go out more than once, you have to change your shirt twice.
Marisol has made a pitcher of sangria, though, and they drink it over ice, like yanqui barbarians, and she’s instructing him that the way to deal with the heat is to sit completely still when his phone rings.
It’s Hidalgo. “Someone grabbed up the Esparza brothers. Well, two of them anyway.”
“Which two?”
“It’s unclear right now,” Hidalgo says. “Univision has had it three ways so far. Check this out—a group of gunmen waltzed into a restaurant in PV where they were having some kind of party, grabbed all the men and took them outside into a van. They let everyone go except for the Esparzas.”
“Who has the balls to do that?”
“I don’t know,” Hidalgo says. “Says something about Sinaloa, though, doesn’t it?”
Yeah, Art thinks—people aren’t afraid of them anymore.
Although they did kick up a short-lived media scare when they threatened “the candidate,” as Keller has come to call him.
Now he says, “I’ll meet you at the office.”
“So much for remaining completely still,” Marisol says.
“I will when I’m dead.”
Plenty of time for that then, he thinks.
Iván is apoplectic. “He has my brothers! He has my brothers!”
“Calm down,” Ric says.
“You fucking calm down!” Iván yells. “He has my brothers! He could have killed them already, for all I know!”
It’s been forty-five minutes, Ric thinks.
If Damien had dropped their bodies somewhere, they’d probably have heard about it by now. And he and Iván have men out all over Puerto Vallarta, cruising the streets, the back roads, searching the beaches. They’re talking to cabdrivers, street people, even tourists, asking if anyone has seen anything.
So far nothing.
And no phone call.
No ransom demand.
What the fuck is Damien doing? Ric wonders. If he wanted to kill the Esparzas, he could have just done it at the restaurant. But now he has hostages. For what? Ransom money? Something else?
“Why did he leave you behind?” Iván asks.
“So he would have someone to negotiate with,” Ric says. “Someone he trusts.”
“That better be the reason,” Iván says.
“What are you saying?” Ric asks.
“I don’t know,” Iván says. “I’m out of my fucking head right now. I swear to God, I’ll take Damien’s sisters, I’ll take his mother—”
“Don’t do anything rash,” Ric says. “Don’t do anything that makes the situation worse. We will work this out. Let’s go back to Culiacán. We can’t do anything here.”
“Don’t tell me what to do,” Iván says. “This is the guy you wanted to show mercy to, right? This is the guy who didn’t do anything all that bad . . . When I find him, and I will find him, I’m going to carve him up like a chicken, then I’m going to slice all the skin off him, then I’m going to start getting serious.”
“If he was going to kill your brothers, he would have done it already.”
“How do you know he hasn’t?”
“Because he can’t,” Ric says. “He’s just figured it out. He went for the home run swing, to take out the Esparza brothers. But he missed the most important one—you. He swung and missed, Iván. Now he has to deal with you.”
“Then why hasn’t he?”
Damien has to make his strikeout look like a hit, Ric thinks. He can do that in the media, pretend this was an exercise to show the world that the Sinaloa cartel isn’t what it used
to be, that he can stick it to them, he’s not afraid and no one else should be, either. So he’ll let the media have a field day with this, just like they did after the raid on the Barrera hacienda. Maybe, hopefully, humiliating the Esparzas is enough for him.
“He’ll hold them until the story loses legs,” Ric says. “Then he’ll let them go. Unless you get stupid here, Iván.”
If Iván goes Iván, gets all crazy and grabs the Tapia women, then Oviedo and Alfredo will probably end up facedown in a ditch somewhere.
And that, Ric thinks, will launch a war that won’t ever end.
His father doesn’t meet him in the office, but in the living room.
Núñez sits in a big easy chair, the cane he needs less and less now leaning on the arm of the chair.
He still looks weak, Ric thinks.
Better, out of danger now, but still weak. He hasn’t gained back much weight, and his face is drawn, his skin pale.
And he speaks softly, as if it’s an effort. “However this works out, I’ll be blamed. They’ll say I’m too passive, too vacillating, so weak that the Young Wolf felt emboldened to walk in and kidnap two of the Sinaloa royal family. And if the Esparza boys are dead, Iván will break away from the cartel and go out on a blood-soaked vendetta against the Tapia organization that will further inflame the country. The government will be forced to respond and will wonder why I can’t keep control. They’ll look for someone who can. Perhaps Tito.”
“Tito was in on this,” Ric says. “He had to give at least his tacit permission for this to have happened in Jalisco.”
“That’s right,” Núñez says. “Tito holds the key, but we can hardly reach out to him.”
So, Ric thinks, we have to reach out to someone who can.
Rafael Caro tilts his chair back.
Ric sees the soles of the old man’s shoes.
The left one has a hole in it.
“Don Rafael,” Núñez Sr. says, “thank you for hosting this meeting. As a venerated, respected elder statesman, the éminence grise, as it were—”
“What’s he talking about?” Caro asks.
“I think he means you have gray hair,” Tito says.
“It’s white,” Caro says. “I’m an old man, retired, no longer connected to the business. I don’t have a dog in this fight. But if that lets me be an objective mediator, I’m happy to do what I can to help settle this problem.”
He might be the only one who can, Ric thinks. The only neutral party with prestige enough to make everyone come to the room, and to accept whatever comes out of it.
When he first got there, Ric was shocked at the famous Rafael Caro’s shabby living conditions. Now they all sit, crowded into the small, stuffy living room as an old TV drones on low volume. There is no table, none of the usual feast that typically accompanies a meeting. Caro’s gofer had just offered each person a glass of water—no ice—and Ric sits on a footstool sipping his from an old jelly jar.
Outside, it’s a different story.
The security is immense.
His father’s people are there, so are Iván’s, and so are Tito’s—all standing by their vehicles, fully armed, waiting for the slightest spark to set this off. Farther off, state police have set up a cordon to keep curious public or, God forbid, media far away.
Not to mention the army or the federales.
Ric knows that’s not going to happen. The government has as much interest in this meeting going well as anyone here. They don’t want this blowing up.
“Why isn’t Damien here?” Iván asks.
“I can speak for him,” Tito says.
“And why is that?”
“Because he knows he’d be killed if he came,” Tito says. “And, as I said—and I won’t say it again—I can speak for him and guarantee he’ll accept whatever decisions are reached here.”
“So that means he’s with you,” Iván says, jumping to his feet. “That means you were in on this with him.”
“Sit down,” Caro says. “Sit down, young man.”
Amazingly, Ric thinks, Iván sits.
He glares at Tito, but the Mastiff doesn’t grace him with a look back. Instead, he addresses Caro. “Some people in this room have tried to have me killed. The same people in this room had my son put in jail, where he remains because these people have told their judges not to set him free. But . . . out of my respect for Ignacio Esparza, I am here as a go-between to try to free his sons.”
“Can you guarantee the Esparza brothers’ safety?” Caro asks him.
“They’re safe and comfortable,” Tito says.
“I want them released!” Iván says.
“Everyone wants them released,” Caro says. “That’s why we’re all here, am I correct? So, Tito, why don’t you tell us what that’s going to take. What does the Young Wolf want?”
“First of all, he wants an apology for murdering his father.”
Iván says, “We didn’t—”
“Your father was part of that decision,” Tito says. “So were other people in this room.”
“As were you,” Núñez says. “I seem to recall that you were particularly effective in fighting the Tapias.”
Tito looks to Caro. “Tell that person not to speak to me.”
“Don’t speak to him,” Caro says. “So?”
“I imagine,” Núñez says, “that we can find some forum to express . . . regret . . . about what happened to the Tapia family.”
Caro looks at Tito. “What else?”
“He wants forgiveness for the attack on the Barrera home,” Tito says.
“He wants a pass for that?!” Iván says. “That’s not right!”
“It’s not a matter of right or wrong,” Caro says. “It’s a matter of power. Tapia has your two brothers and that gives him the power to make demands.”
“But there are standards,” Iván says. “There are rules. You don’t touch families.”
“I’m old enough to remember when Adán Barrera beheaded my old friend’s wife and threw his two children off a bridge,” Caro says. “So let’s not talk about ‘rules.’”
“I can only speak for our organization,” Núñez says, his voice tired. “I can’t speak for Elena. Maybe you can, Tito. But as for us, we are willing to forget the attack on the Barreras. Is there anything else?”
“If Damien releases his hostages,” Tito says, “he wants a guarantee that there will be no recriminations against him.”
“He’s out of his fucking mind,” Iván says. “I’ll kill him, I’ll kill his family—”
“Shut up, Iván,” Ric says.
Iván glares at him.
But he shuts up.
Núñez says, “Young Damien can’t expect to kidnap major figures in the cartel, hold us all up to ridicule in the media, and get away with it. What will people think? We’d lose respect, make ourselves targets.”
“You can’t expect the boy to negotiate his life away,” Tito says. “If he’s going to be killed anyway, he has nothing to lose by killing the Esparzas first.”
“We’re at loggerheads here,” Núñez says.
“I’m tired.” Caro pulls a phone out of his pants pocket and punches in some numbers. While it’s connecting he says, “Sinaloa will issue an apology and forgive the attack on the Barrera home. There will, however, be no amnesty for this kidnapping.”
Tito looks at Iván. “Then your brothers are dead.”
“You swore to protect them,” Iván says.
Caro holds up the phone.
Ric leans forward and sees Rubén, Tito’s son, standing in an office, surrounded by prison guards. His old friend looks scared.
He should.
One of the guards has a knife to his neck.
“The Esparzas will be released,” Caro says to Tito, “or your son’s throat will be cut while you watch. But once they are released, a judge will find that there were no grounds for the charges against your son, that the raid on his house was illegal, and will order him released.”
/> After all, Ric thinks, it’s not about right or wrong, is it?
It’s about power.
“Do we have an agreement, Tito?” Caro asks.
“Yes.” He looks at Núñez and Iván. “This is just a truce, not a peace.”
“Good,” Iván says.
Núñez just nods.
“You had better call young Damien,” Caro says to Tito. “When we hear that the Esparzas are free, the arrangements to free your son will go forward.”
“I need more detail than that.”
“You need more than my word?” Caro asks, staring him down.
Tito doesn’t answer.
“Good,” says Caro. He struggles up from the chair. “Now I’m going for a nap. When I get up, I don’t want to see any of you, and I don’t want to hear that you’ve killed each other. I was at the table when M-1 put this thing together. I was in prison when all of you let it fall apart.”
He walks into his bedroom and shuts the door.
On the drive back Ric asks his father, “You knew about Rubén and the prison before we went in the room, didn’t you? You knew Caro had that kind of influence with the government.”
“Or I wouldn’t have gone in the room,” Núñez says.
“Let me ask you something,” Ric says. “If Tito hadn’t caved, would you have let them kill Rubén?”
“It wasn’t up to me,” Núñez says. “But Caro would have, you can be sure. It was a pretty safe bet that Tito would back down—it’s the rare man willing to be Abraham.”
“What does that mean?”
“That it’s a rare man who will sacrifice his own son.”
Ric smiles. “Which begs the question . . .”
“Of course not,” Núñez says. “I’m shocked you would ask. You’re my son and I love you, Ric. And I’m proud of you. What you’ve done lately . . .”
“So we won.”
“No,” Núñez says. “The world knows Damien felt safe enough to do what he did. That’s a blow to our prestige. I want you to put it out on social media what we did with Rubén. That will help, it will show we’re ruthless. Still potent. Put it out through one of our bloggers so it can’t be tracked back to us. If anyone asks if it really happened, deny it—that will make them believe it even more.”